Jo-ha-kyū (序破急): introduction, break, haste. In gagaku , the old court music, the word names the three movements of a piece. The Noh master Zeami applied it to the structure of a Noh play and to the order of plays in a day’s program.
The encyclopedia Mypedia notes that Zeami made a structure of five sections the basis of Noh composition: one section for jo , three for ha and one for kyū .
The newspaper publisher Nikkei runs a contest for shaka, company songs. Companies and organizations send in videos of their songs, and a public vote and a panel of judges choose the finalists. In 2020, TV Tokyo reported that 174 companies had entered the national contest.
In September 2023, a 25-year-old member of the Takarazuka Revue died. On November 14, 2023, the company said at a press conference that it could not confirm any bullying or harassment, and that the guidance by jōkyūsei, senior members, had been within the scope of work.
On March 28, 2024, the company and its parent group signed an agreement with the family. They accepted 14 of the 15 acts of harassment that the family had raised, and the chairman of the parent group apologized in person.
Uchiawase (打ち合わせ): a meeting to discuss something in advance. A page of Ritsumeikan University on gagaku, the old court music, explains that the word comes from this music. At certain points in a piece, the wind players start in time with the drums and other instruments. From this, the word came to mean consulting and discussing beforehand.
Seimitsu saiten, precise scoring, is the scoring system of the karaoke maker DAM. It rates the accuracy of pitch, expression, vibrato, long tones, stability and rhythm. The singer’s pitch is compared with the guide melody, which is made to follow the original song closely.
An explainer in ITmedia passes on the advice that where the guide melody differs from the original recording, following the guide melody raises the score.
Okyakusama wa kamisama desu: the customer is god. The line is famous as the words of the singer Minami Haruo. In his book Kagei no tenchi of 1984, he explained that in this sense the audience is a gathering of absolute beings, and that he had been taught that the absolute between heaven and earth is god.
His daughter, Minami Miyuki of his management company, says that the true meaning of the phrase is entirely different from its use today in cases of customer harassment.
The composer Takemitsu Tōru titled a collection of his essays Oto, chinmoku to hakariaeru hodo ni: sound, strong enough to be measured against silence. He wrote that poetry and music were born when sound was voiced against silence.
Aogeba tōtoshi (When We Look Up to Our Teachers) was published in 1884 in the third volume of the Shōgaku Shōka Shū, the songbook for elementary schools. It thanks teachers and says farewell.
In a survey by Nihon Trend Research in January 2022, 800 adults named the songs they had sung at their elementary school graduation. Aogeba tōtoshi ranked second overall, and first among people in their sixties and seventies or older.
Article 18 of the Law on the Protection of the Rights and Interests of the Elderly, revised in December 2012 and in force since July 1, 2013, says: “Family members who live apart from the elderly should often visit or greet them. Employers shall, in accordance with the relevant state provisions, guarantee the supporters’ right to home-visit leave.”
At the CCTV Spring Festival Gala of 1999, Chen Hong, Cai Guoqing, Zhang Mai and Jiang Tao sang 常回家看看, “Come Home Often.”
The song Tuanjie jiu shi liliang, Unity Is Strength, was written in the summer of 1943, during a local campaign, led by the Party, to review the reduction of rents and interest. According to People’s Daily, Mu Hong wrote the words in twenty minutes, lying on a villager’s roof. Lu Su then set them to music in a little more than ten minutes, on a villager’s millstone.